I've started this week feeling better, more rested and more rooted in who I am. It's strange how something so small threw me off my centre so quickly and after a lot of sleep, chocolate and art I am glad to report that I am quietly healing whilst allowing the energetic root of the situation to unravel. For those that don't know I was asked to remove my art from a local cafe because of it's “occult symbolism”. I won't go into the mechanics of it all because I feel like I did that in my facebook post/mailing list and to do it now just picks at something that, if I'm honest, is still a little sore. I'm O.K though. The cafe that was displaying my art has apologized and I accept the apology in the spirit with which it was given. This week Stu has also been off work because he's poorly so that's been a real reminder of what's important. Family, in all it's definitions. The other added blessing in this experience was knowing just how far my reach has been over the years and just how many of you have stepped forward to share love with me when my feelings were hurt. The validation of my art, the willingness to ready yourselves and stand with me has really let me know that all of the love I have been trying to put out there over the years is sewn into the very corners of my life. Honestly your words, your messages and those of you who stopped me in the street for a quick hug are golden in my life. Golden.

I cannot write this experience off as a negative one though. I'm not even sure if I believe in the whole positive and negative thing any more. It feels too binary to apply to the universal tapestry we live in. I have truly felt the hand of the Universe in all of this and I can see why I was intuitively called to put my work there in the first place. I'm also not entirely sure it's done, even though I am actively trying to put the whole thing behind me I still have to remind myself every now and again that God is a verb, to treat compassion like a verb and to be as kind as I can be whilst still asserting appropriate boundaries. You have to love people where they live and read the intentions behind the words. That can only really be done when you are willing to self reflect and hold yourself accountable to the energy you put out there into the world. I truly believe that the world reflects back to us what we think about ourselves. We live the sum of who we are and whilst my intention was just to share my art with the world it is also now clear that my old survival skill of “going under the radar” is still present in my energy. I've spoken to you all before about that part of my experience, that learning to live as a gay person in a hostile environment meant I had to learn to be invisible. That is why whenever I put something out there there is still, to this day, a knee jerk response in me as to whether or not I should. It's tribal, root chakra stuff.

I deserve to be seen. I am worthy. I am loving. I am the lens through which wonder exacts itself in my life. The only way to change the direction of my energy is to choose a new direction. So, instead of hiding away under the guise of “healing” I have to directly challenge the space I am going to. So this week I have set myself a small challenge of finding other places to display my art and contact them. So many of you have already given me some wonderful leads and I shall follow them up and I am also considering starting some sort of art group/collective. I know the old energy will still exact itself, you can't stop a ripple in a pond dead in it's tracks but you can throw a bigger stone in and watch as it over rides the whole thing!